Page 1 of 1

Accusump review

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2018 10:45 am
by mooreken
As you may remember I blew up my first motor at the FIRM last year. I assumed that a piston broke and it might very well have been the problem. However the rod and crank were blued up also which leads to oil pressure issues also.

I am using a circle track 7qt oil that has trap doors (I also had the same type pan on the first motor) so I thought that much oil should stay in place around the pickup. But as the story goes never assume. I took Tom's advice and installed an oil pressure light while I had the car down for the motor repairs.
On one of the many road tests jetting the carb, I made a hard right hand turn into my driveway. To my surprise the oil light came on for a second during the hard turn.
While I knew that the circle track is for left turns I didn't expect the problem that a slow speed hard right turn would move that much oil away from the pickup, but I can't disput the bright red light on the dash.

I went on a search for an Accusump and found one on eBay with the electric valve for $220 that looked hardly used. The valve alone is about that price.

For those that don't know the Accusump holds 3qt of oil under pressure and will push pressured oil into the motor if the oil pressure in the motor drops below 37lbs. Then the extra oil is pumped back into the Accusump when the motor pressure comes back up.

After the first session at Daytona I felt the Accusump and it was quite warm so the motor oil was moving back and forth to the Accusump.
I am now a firm believer like Tom in the Accusump system. Money well spent if one is to do track days with old school motors.
Ken

Re: Accusump review

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2018 11:05 am
by Tom Wells
Ken,

All good points. Don't leave the staging area without one!

At some track day events in the dim past, say more than 5 years ago, I've seen modern V8s blow. I wondered if their oil pressure suffered a similar fate, but no way to know for certain. If I was going to track a new -ish car, I still think I'd add an Accusump.

BTW, did you keep the oil pressure light? If so, did it come on?

There are different pressure switches available for the Accusump. I use the 20-25psi switch on both of mine, as the engine idle pressure is below that on each engine.

Tom

Re: Accusump review

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2018 11:13 am
by mooreken
To be honest I didn't take the time to look at the light. I just trusted the sump to did it's job.
Small block chevy pressure is much high than yours. It is always 60lbs or more even at hot oiltemps it is always over 50 at idle.